PHOTOGRAPHS FROM DAILY, IN A NIMBLE SEA published by SILAS FINCH

DAILY, IN A NIMBLE SEA, is an anagram of “BAILEY ISLAND, MAINE,” where a tiny stretch of coastline is incessantly transformed by the interactions of fog, sun, and tides. When the tide goes out, a rocky field of seaweed is revealed. To walk across it is to traverse the ocean floor in the open air. It is a magical place, and for seven summers I have watched my girls grow and change against this backdrop. Photographs put a feeble defense against the passage of time: the still image halts the waves from breaking, only to paradoxically heighten our awareness of their inevitable movement forward.

These pictures were made with a digital camera. The code from the digital photographs also forms a kind of picture, expressed as a field of symbols. In this volume sections of code are sequenced alongside the photographic images they were extracted from. These symbols, like an anagram, can be rearranged and purposely disordered, resulting in gestural aberrations or glitches to create to alternate versions of the original digital capture.

This creates a picture book representing a fantasy of fatherhood, endless horizons, and malleable realities.